


A good heart

by sundaystyle



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Clint Barton Feels, Empathy, F/M, Fluff, Friendship/Love, POV Natasha Romanov, Post-Avengers (2012), Protective Natasha Romanov
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-14
Updated: 2014-09-14
Packaged: 2018-02-17 10:16:54
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 636
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2306102
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sundaystyle/pseuds/sundaystyle
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>At the schwarma place, after a long, difficult war, Natasha thinks about the man sitting next to him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A good heart

**Author's Note:**

  * For [pamelaroseee](https://archiveofourown.org/users/pamelaroseee/gifts).



The chair is far from comfortable. It's loud with the sirens outside, although the crisis is over the panic still goes on. She could feel the pull of her muscles, the burn of her wounds and all she wants to do is take off her clothes, maybe take a nice bath and put her feet up to relax. The schwarma is good, though, so she pushes it aside for the moment. 

They are all here, enjoying the somewhat calmness they bring each other. It's been hectic, it's been scary and for a moment Natasha felt really helpless. Scared to death, she realized, and for both her sake and for others. She stole a glance to the man beside her, calmly eating. He tilts his head slightly to meet her gaze. Natasha didn't know if he could tell what she was thinking about but she could tell that he was thinking the same. They made it out alive, somehow. 

She chewed slowly, still keeping her eyecontact. Clint Barton, codename Hawkeye. None of the others at the table knew what he was capable of, even though he was only a human. A super soldier, a God, a genius, the Hulk and her, well, she was not a super soldier but genetically experimented on enough times to count as one of the luckier ones. She knew Clint gained all his 'powers' from hardwork, and maybe a little help from the technology. The man was smarter than anyone gave him credit for. He was the best marksman in the history of S.H.I.E.L.D's and also one of the guys with a good heart. 

Natasha kept staring at him passively, to the man with a good heart such as that she wanted to protect it from any harm. He's not pure, far from it, and he's had as much red in his ledger as she knew she did, if not more with the history of military tagging behind him. A story she was told, in the confidentiality of friendship they seem to have. A sort of friendship Natasha wasn't sure how to label. Partners, was sufficient possibly.

Now she stared at the man she owed her life to. The man who protected her from even her own dark thoughts, the man who talks and jokes carelessly and sometimes annoys the hell out of her. The man who experienced something she'd never want him to go through. Something she could relate but wishes he never could. She froze at the sudden thought that what would have happened if she couldn't bring him back. If Loki kept the heart of the man she respected. The death she was threatened with was not what scared her, but she knew that it would kill Clint before Loki ever could. Clint's good heart wouldn't be able to live with the weight of it. She didn't even know if he could live with what it did so far, but she'd do her damnest to protect him from anything that dares to bring harm. Even if it's himself.

Love, is for children. 

Love is an optimistic word. A word that holds dreams, hopes and a future. Natasha has none. It's a dare, she knows. Respect, is so much more than that. Love could fade, love could trick and love would hurt. Only children didn't know it would, and they would soon find out. Natasha Romanoff was an adult.

But as their eyes met and she blinked slowly, he nudged her with his feet on her chair and she felt a rush of happiness run through her veins- not that she would ever confess. He was alive, he was here, they survived it.

She might not be in love with Clint Barton.  
But no one was to say she wasn't feeling anything close to it.


End file.
